


(Charlotte Sometimes) Dreams a Wall Around Herself

by kbs_was_here



Category: Baby-Sitters Club - Ann M. Martin
Genre: F/F, Teen Angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-24
Updated: 2014-04-24
Packaged: 2018-01-20 15:18:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,773
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1515215
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kbs_was_here/pseuds/kbs_was_here
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Charlotte spends her high school existence dealing with her feelings for Stacey.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Maybe That's Never

**Author's Note:**

> This is a repost of fic that was originally housed at ffnet as separate one-shots, but I've compiled them all into one master story. It's something of a spin-off of The Kristy Thomas Guide to High School Romance.

I'm serving a sentence. The crime is love. The term is six years. I'm halfway to my release.

Fuck, that sounds so overdramatic. This is the kind of shit those Ricky Ullman fan club girls write all over their notebooks. I might have to throw up before I can continue.

I'm Charlotte Johannsen. I'm fifteen. All this crap about serving time for the heart can be boiled down to this: I got rejected, so I skipped town. Sweet deal, huh? She's older than me and told me to wait till I was older, so now we're both passing the time away from each other just so we can find out if she was blowing me off or if she was actually serious.

Whatever. That's later. Currently, I'm making do with life in boarding school. It's funny, some girls got sent here as a punishment, to clean up their acts, crap like that. I wanted to come here. Figured it'd be stimulating to throw myself into the mix with a couple hundred girls. And I thought the academics might be a challenge, too.

When I first got here, I was twelve, stupidly planning to save myself for the love of my life, thinking I could manage the time by burying myself in schoolwork and any extra curriculars that didn't demand me putting myself in front of people. Shy was a good descriptive adjective for me back then. Still can be now, only not so much. Naïve would be another one.

Not so much now. We all grow, we all change, we all make out with girls we barely know at parties we probably shouldn't be at in the first place because your French final is tomorrow at eight am sharp but you don't care, for the first time in your life, you really don't fucking care. And it's the best choice you ever made because that was the end of the old Charlotte and the beginning of this Charlotte, the one who sleeps through half her classes and still manages to pull a 4.1 GPA which is enough to keep the faculty off her back so she can do whatever she wants as long as she shows up for class.

Shandi should be back by now. She went into town with some of the other fourth floor girls. Shandi's my roommate. In some senses, I suppose she's like a girlfriend. There's some making out. Hell, there's a lot of it. Tons if she manages to score a bottle of flavored vodka from her brother, Kyle. He's in community college and hooks her up whenever he's working at the liquor store down on Sixth Street. No sex, though. Not yet, anyway.

When I first met her, I couldn't get past her name. What the fuck kind of name is Shandi, right? I saw her around school, didn't say much to her, because, why? Then, when we got our room assignments this year, there she was, bringing out the fuckability factor of the Westlake Academy uniform. Which is ironic, because, as I said before. No sex. Yet.

She's sixteen. A year older than me. I skipped a grade way back when, which is fine, because this means I get to stare at junior girls all class period.

Fuck, I sound like some undersexed teen boy. I have had sex, for the record. Just not with Shandi. Not that I'm whoring it up. I'm not a slut, despite what some people may pass around in the locker room. I'm just not going to sit around and stare at my shoes if there's someone interested, even if it is just experimental or whatever.

Stacey says to be careful. Her last email was loaded with advice about not getting wrapped up in straight girls because I'll just get my heart broken. Which is goddamn ridiculous, coming from her. It's her fault I'm here, spending nights filtered though cheap chardonnay with girls like Marie Gerard, who had just gotten dumped by her public school jock boyfriend and was looking to just forget the stupid bastard for five minutes. I didn't say that, though. My return email was full of enthusiasm for passing all her midterms at NYU. I even threw in something friendly about her new boyfriend of the moment.

Christ, I sound like some kind of bitch. I want Stacey to be doing well and happy and everything. I worry about her. Then again, I'm sure she worries about me.

All's fair, right?

What the hell is taking Shandi so long? I knew I should have gone along and gotten cigarettes myself. I'm about the claw the eyes out of Ricky Ullman Fan Club for playing, of all pieces of shit on earth, the Macarena on repeat like it's something new and brilliant as it eats through the carpet under my feet and permeates my brain.

That's it. I'm putting the speakers face down on the floor and cranking Romeo Void.

I hope fucking Kyle's working this afternoon.


	2. I'm Not Okay

Some things just naturally suck, like that weird soda from a few years ago with the jello shit floating in it or Jessica Simpson covering any song or the winter holidays.

Thanksgiving means I get to truck back home to Stoneybrook, brood in my bedroom for most of the weekend, and avoid all the hometown losers who pretend like they've missed me, when I really know they haven't even given a second fucking thought to the fact that I've been away for the last four years. Most of them, anyway. Vanessa Pike's cool. Simply because she'll make out with anyone after two or three shots.

Christmas is worse, though. Two weeks back at the homestead, being shuttled around to family parties and other festivities. This season was a little different. Better, even. Being the sixteen year old only daughter of a reasonably successful doctor translates to things like cars as gifts. Nothing too fancy, but wheels nonetheless.

And this is how Vanessa and I ended up cruising central Manhattan in my Saturn Ion just two days after Christmas.

"Maybe there!" Vanessa rolled down the window to get a better look at a possible parking space.

I immediately hit the button to her window. "Keep them up. It's too fucking cold out."

"Sorry." She sipped on her spiked cherry coke and went back to watching for an open space.

"Fuck it, I'll just pay."

"Wait, there!"

"I'll never fit."

"There's plenty of room."

"When's the last time you parallel parked?"

"I hadta do it for the driving test."

"The one you failed, twice?"

"That's because of speeding. I parked just fine."

By some miracle, I managed to squeeze into the open space. "Well, damn, we fit."

I grabbed the coke and downed the rest of the drink. I was not nearly drunk enough. And frankly, neither was Vanessa. I climbed into the back of the car, popped one of the seats forward and pulled a bottle of Skyy Citrus from the trunk. Vodka's like a Vanessa magnet, so she was over the seats and next to me in about three seconds. We slugged back a few rounds, giggling as the buzz set in, kissing once it was there to stay for a while.

"We're fogging up the windows," I mumbled, catching my breath.

"So?" She pulled me right back into her, lips on mine.

I gave in for another minute, then broke away. "So… we didn't drive all this way just to do what we can do in the Stoneybrook Rec Center parking lot."

One hand checked to make sure my keys were in my pocket, the other wrapped itself around Vanessa's hand and pulled her out of the car. We staggered for the first block or so, but the cold air took a layer of the buzz off, forcing focus into us.

"Here. This one. Shandi said they don't card unless it's a weekend." I nudged Vanessa toward the end of a line leading into a club.

She made a face. "Shandi." Vanessa doesn't like to talk about any of my other make out buddies, which is totally hypocritical, because she gives out hand jobs like Halloween candy.

"No! I'm NOT going home. YOU go home." Ahead of us, someone shoved a guy out of the line toward the street.

The guy glared at the girl who pushed him, then moved back toward her. Vanessa and I exchanged glances.

"The fuck?" I leaned around the people in front of us. I could see the guy grabbing someone by the arm. He wasn't very big, probably five-nine, one-sixty. "Stay here."

"FRANK! Fuck off!" The girl yanked her arm free, but he just grabbed her again.

"Hey, Frank." He turned to look at me. It was probably really hard to see me because my fist connected with his nose shortly thereafter.

"Fuckin' bitch…" Frank teetered for a moment, holding his hand to his bloody face.

The bouncer stepped between us. "You're all going to have to leave."

"Charlotte?"

"Vanessa, I said to stay back…" But she hadn't said my name. It was Frank's date. And after finally taking a look at her, I could see why she knew my name. "Stacey?"

"What the hell are you doing here?"

"Putting assholes in their place." I looked back at Frank and couldn't suppress the giggle that surfaced.

"Are you drunk?"

I shrugged. "Brawl's kind of a buzzkill."

"Does your mom know where you are?"

"Does yours?"

"I'm not sixteen."

I rolled my eyes. "Yeah. I know. You're a considerable four years older than I am. Like I could ever forget."

"Charlotte, I…"

The bouncer was still staring at me, waiting for me to leave.

"Look, I'd love to catch up, but I've kind of got plans to get wasted and get laid. By someone my own age. Besides, your… boyfriend probably needs a band aid." I whipped around and walked back to Vanessa, pulling her out of line.

We polished off the vodka, fogged the tinted windows right back up, and crossed lines we'd maintained until that night. Before then, it had just been making out, over the clothes kind of stuff. But seeing Stacey just made me want to forget her, any way I could.

I don't think Vanessa seemed to mind. In fact, I think maybe she didn't mind a little too much.


	3. Gradual

The benefits of being that super-smart kid range from the license to be a goddamn know-it-all to Get Out of Jail Freebies like early graduation.

The benefits of fucking your best friend range from the ability to know what they're thinking to sleepovers that don't arouse suspicion because, hey, you're best friends.

Vanessa Pike was the best distraction I'd ever encountered. The problem? She was just that. A distraction. Not that I didn't, don't, love her. Hell, it's impossible not to. But she's In Love with me and my heart's wrapped up somewhere else. Fuck. Not even wrapped. Buried. Not for long, though. Diggin' time's getting closer and closer. Like that stupid time capsule. A bunch of random crap from years ago, waiting to be unearthed and remind the whole world of all the petty shit that was so fucking important to us back then. Like, not missing a new episode of Veronica Mars or caring what my mother thought or… Stacey McGill.

It's like I'm due for parole and I'm knee deep in some desperate attempt to not fuck this up. Well, sir, I've shown myself capable of holding down a steady relationship (see: Shandi; Vanessa). I've also shown interesting extra curriculars that could benefit—

Fuck all. Under all the snark and anger is good old-fashioned heartache. Don't tell the kids, but that bitch, Charlotte Johannsen, is a softie. She bleeds just like everyone else. Especially on the inside.

That means it hurts, right now, looking out there, at that sea of faces, and having my eyes land on her. Six rows back, between my parents and a third of the Pikes. At least she didn't bring the latest flunkie. I hate those pretentious faux artistic bastards she's been attracting this year. It's always a different version of the same stubbly skinny guy, thick rimmed and reeking of nag champa.

I suppose I'd feel just as bad if she hadn't shown up. I wonder if there's a way I can avoid talking to her at the reception. Probably not. It's in the banquet hall at the hotel, though. Maybe I can just book a room and sneak off with Vanessa like we did during the Christmas party. Only, this time, we'll set a couple ground rules about it just being sex to avoid any temptation to repeat the infamous "I love you" incident. Like I said, it's not that I don't have any return feelings, they're just not in the same league. Not for her, anyway.

I'll have to figure it out later, when I'm not thirty seconds away from the biggest speech of my life, thus far. Which is all just bullshit, really. I could belch the alphabet and it would have the same repercussions a decade from now. Graduation speeches are just another one of those things people make such a fuss about at the time but, after college and a couple years in the corporate pool, can't seem to recall any particular outstanding details about. Actually, the whole alphabet thing would probably be easier to rouse up in the memory. Too bad my mother would kill me.

The benefits of being Charlotte Johanssen are never terribly apparent. There's the smarts, sure, but they ultimately get me into more trouble than they're worth.


	4. Right Round Round Round

It had all come down to this. Six years of pining and pretending I wasn't pining and pining through the non-pining façade.

I'd gone away. Left my quaint little hometown of Stoneybrook, CT. Immersed myself in a life somewhere else. But I still kept in contact, usually pretending things were much more upbeat than they were. In fact, I'll bet some of my emails made it sound like I was living The Facts Of Life, complete with unspoken (and spoken) lesbian subtext.

In case you stepped into this without any concept of researching the backstory, I'm Charlotte Johannsen. I was valedictorian last year at Westlake All Girls Boarding and Preparatory School. The reason I ended up in no-man's land? Personal choice. See, I was (am) in love with this girl who have me the brush off. Well, a quasi-brush off. She gave me this speech about age difference and the indiscretions of youth or whatever. Anyway, the deal was that if I still felt the way I did by the time I hit the big one-eight, she'd reconsider. Which all seems like a bundle of crap, but I was twelve and she was sixteen and gorgeous and the epitome of everything I could (do) ever want, so I decided to hold out. I just couldn't do it in the same town. I needed to grow and find myself or something.

And I did. I learned a hell of a lot about myself and the world and other people and bi-curious girls who are only bi-curious because they've done too many Jello shooters vs. girls who actually like girls and hangovers and drunk dialing the very girl you're specifically trying to not think about and so very much, much more.

After graduation, I spent the better part of a year doing things alone. I didn't apply to college because I'd just spent six years locked away getting educated and didn't feel much like jumping right back into the same exact thing. I didn't hang out with old flings like Shandi, my Westlake roommate/girlfriend, or Vanessa, an old hometown friend/girlfriend. I didn't even call Stacey (see: the girl in question). I avoided any and all contact with Pre-Grad Charlotte. Well, except for my parents. They're good people and I didn't want them to worry. I feel sorry for them that they ended up with such an angry emo kid like me, if I may slap a generalized generational label on myself. They know I'm bordering on brilliant and all I can show for it is an understanding that the majority of the world is bullshit.

I took my hefty chunk of graduation money and found myself a roommate in lower Manhattan. His name was Deke and he was, yes, an artist and, yes, a poet and, yes, an actor. And yes, gay. My bedroom was about a third of the size of my old dorm room, but it was the first room I had to myself in years.

Deke and I got along well because we both minded our own goddamn business. The place was too small to have parties and he usually spent most of his time out at poetry readings or acting class or peddling his work on the streets, so I rarely saw him. He was nice enough to point me in the direction of a coffeehouse/used bookshop that his brother managed. And that's how I began my career as a coffee wench. It was actually a perfect job. The day crowd was steady but laid back, leaving me plenty of time to check out the bookshelves that lined the shop. It was those shelves that started me thinking about Stacey, again.

I'd managed to fall in step with my new New York life. And while Stacey's a New York girl herself, the city's diverse enough that there were plenty of things around that didn't remind me of her. Be that as it may, I'd still stumble over things that would rush thoughts of Stacey directly to the forefront of my brain, but I'd shove them right back.

I'd had my mom send a box of books from home to donate to the shop. Just old stuff I didn't read anymore, or books she didn't want.

Nick, my manager, shuffled through the box to check for torn pages or broken bindings. "You sure this one goes in here?" He slid a hardcover book across the counter.

The Cricket in Times Square. The fucking Cricket in Times Square. I flipped open the cover. "Love to Charlotte, my favorite kid, from Stacey, her favorite baby-sitter."

And that's how I ended up in Chelsea, outside Stacey's apartment building, holding the Cricket in one hand and a pint of Seagrams vodka in the other. I didn't start out with the Seagrams. I picked it up from the corner mini mart once I realized she wasn't home. Actually, I paid a guy an extra five bucks to get it for me. I was old enough to legally get laid by men three times my age, but I still couldn't buy booze.

I don't even know why I went there. I'd managed ten months of not talking to her. Even when my birthday passed earlier this year, I didn't answer when she called. In my initial fantasy, this actually should have all played out on my birthday. I'd show up, freshly eighteen, and present myself to her. She'd smile and ask me to come inside for coffee, because that's what adults do. Have coffee. I was twelve when I brewed this image up, okay? And then we'd kiss and it would all be terribly romantic. Again, twelve. But that day came and went, and there was coffee, but I was selling it to people who weren't Stacey. And when my cell phone rang, I hit Silent and deleted the message without listening. Which, in retrospect, makes the previous six years seem like a lot of work for nothing, I know.

But now, the silence was broken. Or trying to break. Hell, I was ready to shatter it. But she wasn't there. And really, she could have been any number of places. It was seven-thirty on a Tuesday night in April. Maybe she was in class. Or at dinner. Or on a date. Maybe she'd gone back to visit her mom in Stoneybrook. Fuck, what if she was sick? Stacey was diabetic and had ended up in the hospital more than a few times. Maybe she'd moved. I marched up the steps and double-checked the buzzer button. I knew it must say S. McGill because I'd already pressed it when I first showed up. But you never can be too sure. I punched it again. Nothing.

"Fuck this."

I stormed across the street, took one more swig of vodka, and chucked the bottle at the stone front building. It exploded, raining bits of glass and liquor all over the sidewalk. It's funny how damaging something else can make you feel better.

I pivoted to my right, in the direction of the nearest subway station, and ran into someone and their armload of groceries.

"Fuck, I'm sorry."

"Quite the mouth you've developed."

You know, for a city so damned full of people, it sure conjures up a hell of a lot of coincidences.

"I was just... I came to see... I came to give this to you." I held out the book.

Stacey looked over the cover of the book, but she didn't take it. Probably because her arms were full of groceries.

She peered over the tops of the paper bags. "That's yours."

"Well, I don't want it anymore."

"I don't know what the hell is up with you, but can you at least let me get this stuff inside?"

I was apparently one grade-A asshole. "Yeah. Sure. Sorry."

It felt weird, apologizing. I hadn't really done that to anyone in years. Not genuinely, anyway. I even grabbed one of the bags, without asking if she wanted help.

We walked in silence up the three flights of stairs to her apartment. She lived alone in a tiny one bedroom. But while it was small, it was definitely Stacey, elegantly hip and organized, with a huge framed vintage movie poster of Mary Poppins on one wall.

I set the bag down on the kitchen counter, watching her as she went to work putting everything away.

"So, why're you here? Is this really just about the book?"

Why was I there? Was it really just about the book? Nice, Char. Let's just mentally repeat the things people are asking us.

"I... yeah, I just found it... and I figured..." I leaned against the counter, pushing the book around with my finger.

She folded the empty grocery bags and stuck them under the sink. "You figured?"

"Actually, I figured this would all go much differently."

"Me too."

"Right, like you've given this much thought."

"I've thought about it plenty."

"Well, you sure have a lousy way of showing it."

She shook her head, annoyed. "Charlotte, you're the one who disappeared for a fucking year."

"Quite the mouth you've developed."

"And even before that, you changed. You left Stoneybrook and Charlotte, the Charlotte I knew, disappeared."

"Maybe you just didn't know me that well."

"You know what, leave the book or whatever. Go figure out your life and let me know how it falls into place."

"So that's it? In and out in less than five minutes?"

"I don't know what else to say to you."

She stood there, twenty-two and wavy blonde, in her DKNY jeans and NYU sweatshirt, looking tired and overwhelmed, her eyes searching my face, probably for some kind of recognition of that kid who wept her way through summer camp and skipped a grade and got ecstatic at the idea of new books in the Kid-Kit. And I wanted to scream that she was still in here, still shy as all hell, still afraid of so many things, still the same old Charlotte but she'd just perfected this existential exoskeleton to survive in a world without Stacey McGill, Super-Sitter.

I wanted to scream. But, instead, I did something I hadn't done in half a decade. I cried.

I hate crying, specifically in front of other people. I used to do it all the time when I was scared or lonely or unsure. When I left for Westlake, I made the conscious choice to turn it off. A new Charlotte for a new day. And New Charlotte didn't cry and didn't take shit and didn't care. She did what she needed to do and what she wanted to do and things got done.

But now, here I was, in this place I'd been wanting and needing to be... and I didn't know what to do with it.

"Stace..."

She didn't move, didn't say anything.

I took in a deep breath, trying to steady myself. The worst part about tears is talking through them.

"Stacey, I just miss you. And I know I was only twelve and it was stupid of me to even think... and now, I'm not twelve and it's still so stupid and..." I slid to the floor, pulling my knees up to my chest. "I just really, really miss you."

She was suddenly next to me, one arm wrapped tightly around my shoulders. "I really miss you, too, Char."

We stayed like that for a long time, digging up memories that had been buried for a good ten years and talking about stuff we'd done since then. Just talk. No coffee. No kissing. Not even when we were both exhausted and she pulled me into the bedroom where we both slept, her arm securely draped over me and her face resting against my shoulder.

The morning, however, did boast some of that coffee, along with more talking. Discussion of how I did, in fact, love her and how I wasn't really sure what to do with that and further discussion of how she did, in fact, love me and she wasn't really sure what to do with that.

And things were awkward for a while, yet strangely comfortable at the same time. Hanging out, watching movies, trips to Central Park and the Met were accomplished with ease. It was the underlying tension of a mutual attraction that may or may not result in complete disaster that terrified us. Well, I know it scared the hell out of me.

That fear would last about two and a half weeks.

We were walking from the subway station to her apartment, caught up in a discussion about the latest movie adapted to Broadway musical when she just stopped in the middle of the sidewalk.

"What's the matter?" I looked back at her. "Stacey?"

"Hey, Char?"

"Yeah?"

"I know I'm only twenty-two and I'm still not done with all this stupid growing up stuff..." She absently chewed her lip as she laid out her next thought. "And I... I've only ever dated loser guys who ended up dragging me down every single time and... Well, I just mean, it's been me and guys and I've never really thought about being gay or even bisexual or whatever..."

"Stacey, what are—"

"But I love you, Charlotte. I've thought about you every day. Every day since that afternoon in the rec center parking lot. I thought about who you might grow up to be and if you'd even remember me when you got older."

"I couldn't forget you if I tried. Hell, I did try."

She gave me an amused look. "I'm trying to tell you that I... Screw it."

Her hand grabbed mine and pulled me into her, face to face. In the past, I have always initiated the first kiss. Not so this time around.

For someone who hadn't given serious thought to kissing other girls, Stacey sure wasn't holding back. I'd heard of people getting weak-kneed from a good kiss, but this was the first time I'd ever experienced it. When we broke apart, I couldn't decide if I should first catch my breath or my balance.

I quickly managed to recover them both, then rested my head against her shoulder. "You're sure about this?"

"If you are."

"Hey, I was sure about six years ago."

"Some things just take time."

"Yeah. And it gave me a chance to learn all kinds of lesbian sex tips from the internet."

"Wow."

"You don't know the half of it."

"I guess someone better fill me in."

"I might know someone."

She kissed the top of my head. "Figured you might."

And that was that. The beginning of the rest of everything. Which seems so boring and cliché, I know. Maybe, if you're lucky, I'll come back with some sordid details about some totally hot post-fight aggressive sex. Or, maybe I'll just say that I've spent a lot of time being angry and pissed off and I'm finally working out the happier side of my brain.

It's about damn time.


End file.
